SPRING 2007The Community Partnership is based at Bradley Stoke Community School and you can contact us by phone on 01454 868570, by fax on 01454 868572 or email. Or our new website www.sbcommunitypartnership.org.uk If you have any news or information you would like included in our next newsletter, please send it to us by 28th September for inclusion in our October newsletter. Our newsletter is sent to over 100 local community groups and available in libraries and local council offices and on our website. If you would like more information about anything you read, please give us a ring. If you would like the newsletter emailed to you, please let us know
We’re really sorry to be saying goodbye to Ruth Ramsay, Community Development worker for Coniston. Ruth initially came to work with us on the Pride in the Past Young Roots Project, and stayed with as for the following 18 months. “It’s been a challenging job”, says Ruth “It’s been great working with people at Coniston”. Ruth is going to pursue her career as a community artist, and we wish her well
Family Support – our family support team continues to support around 30 families across the area. We’ve recently reviewed the way we co-ordinate the work, and Corrina is now undertaking all initial referrals and developing action plans for family support and the Schools Link project. For more information, please see the Family Support Work newsletter (issue 1), that is available from the office

We have good news and bad in terms of funding for Family Support – we were successful with an application for £10,000 to Garfield Weston, which was great news. However, a bigger bid to Children in Need for more long term funding was unsuccessful – “great application but not enough money to go around”, was the feedback

Extended Schools – this year we have been running 15 after school clubs, parenting workshops and a “Schools Link” project. Yvette Holloway was appointed to co-ordinate the Schools Link work, but has recently left for a more secure job with North Somerset Council. Yvette put in place a great infrastructure for the work, and Charlotte Croome and Lorna Wood are providing support to children and families in schools.
Great news! Southern Brooks Community Partnership has been successful in an application to the Heritage Lottery Fund to run a project in Bradley Stoke and Patchway
The aim of the project is to work with local conservation and history group volunteers and with children at local schools to

We hope that families will get involved and that this project will get more people interested in the local history of the area. It will be the opportunity for the younger members of the community to work alongside older people, and get an insight into how this area was before it was developed. Knowing about the history of the area in which you live has an important role to play in developing a sense of community. We’d also like to involve some of the major local businesses. The grant is for almost £50,000 and it will provide a full time worker and funding to run workshops. We are currently recruiting a full-time project co-ordinator, for more information see the vacancy section

PROJECT NEWS

COMMUNITY EVENTS

BGORDON ROTHERHAM

EXTENDED SCHOOLS

CO-ORDINATOR AND

CHILDRENS FUND MANAGERExtended schools

Since the project started this academic year there have been 342 sessions to date, running in 5 primary and three secondary schools within the cluster with a staff team of 32 over that time. The sessions have been attended by a total 267 children and young people and they have participated in a wide range of activities including art and design, music production, homework and study skills, cookery and healthy eating, sports coaching, circus skills, pottery, participation in a school pond and wildlife project and finally drama.

The sessions have continued to be popular and a number of them are increasing in membership with positive feedback from users and schools.

Children’s Fund

The children’s fund sessions have been running successfully with two sessions every Saturday for a total of 50 sessions to date. The staff team has expanded to four regular staff managed by Nicola Alan and they are providing varied activities for a membership aged from 9-13. The sessions have included sports coaching, a Big Brother video project, art, health awareness as well as involving the young people in planning and implementation of other activities.

RADLEY STOKE COMMUNITY FESTIVAL

FRIDAY 8TH JUNE – SUNDAY 10TH JUNE 2007

This is a year of celebration for the town of Bradley Stoke as it celebrates its 20th Birthday. The Festival promises to be bigger and better with new activities including an ice rink, a car boot sale, Children’s Birthday Picnic, House of Gingerbread Craft and Traders stalls, fun run, Walking to Health, Open Air church service, celebration of Cultural Diversity, Youth events and “Wild Savages” Full festival programmes are available from our office, or Bradley Stoke Town Council, or at community buildings throughout the town.

New for this year, the Town Council are running “PRIDE IN BRADLEY STOKE - a Good Neighbour and Community Award

This aims to promote community spirit by recognising people of all ages across the Town who have made positive contributions to the developing community.

There are three categories for nominations:

Good Neighbour Award

Community Award

Youth Award

Residents could be nominated for an award by helping out others with household chores, assisting with shopping, visiting those living alone or in hospital and helping to run events in the community.
The closing date is 31 May. There will be just one winner in each category. Each of the winners will receive vouchers, together with a certificate and commemorative shield. The awards will be presented by the Mayor and Richard Angwin of BBC Points West at a Civic Reception on the 9 June 2007.Nomination Form and Guidelines are available from Bradley Stoke Town Council on 01454 868080
Vouchers for the category winners are very kindly being presented by Bradley Stoke Matters for the Community Award, Bradley Stoke Examiner for the Youth Award and Bradley Stoke Town Council for the Good Neighbour Award. Completed forms should be sent to Lesley Osborne, Deputy Town Clerk, Bradley Stoke Town Council, 7 The Courtyard, Woodlands, Bradley Stoke, South Glos BS32 4NQ.For further information please contact Lesley Osborne on 01454 868080 or email lesley@bradleystoke.gov.uk
SBCP is helping to co-ordinate the community stalls bookings, so if your group would like to be involved on the Saturday, please ring the office. Having a stall is a great way of making money for your group and raising your profile in the town, as well as having an enjoyable afternoon. We’re also pulling together the event on Sunday afternoon, from 1 – 4 pm, that will be a celebration of the many different cultures that make up this diverse community. There will be lots of things to take part in, including Egyptian Dance, Tai Chi, Chinese Lion Dancing, arts and crafts from around the world, puppet shows and story telling. Why not come along to the Open Air Church service, bring a picnic and stay for the day.

“Wild Savages!"

Sunday 17 June 2007 11 am – 4 pm – meet the amazing variety of nature residing in one Bradley Stoke's green gems, Three Brooks Local Nature Reserve. A nature trail with a difference – A costumed spectacular of wildlife characters will reveal the fascinating story of the reserve’s woodland, Savages Wood, a very special place for wildlife.

Collect your passport and quiz at the Savages Wood border control, and have it stamped as you brave the Savages Trail to meet its many residents. Free Entry but booking essential – For further information please call Avon Wildlife Trust 0117 9177270 and to book a walk at 11.00, 11.30, 12.00 or 1.30, 2.00, 2.30, 3.00. There will be fun activities for children: storytelling, log slice palettes, and woodland animal masks. Conservation Groups will be holding stalls in the picnic area.

Event supported by the Heritage Lottery, The Prudential’s Grass Roots Project, Quartet, Bradley Stoke Community Festival and South Gloucestershire Council

PATCHWAY FESTIVAL

The theme for the 2007 Festival is Music and Dance and we’d like as many groups as possible to host events. The Festival runs this year for the whole month of July and, although the Festival Committee organises some events, many others are organised by local groups. The Festival offers a marvellous opportunity for community groups, local schools and businesses to promote themselves by joining in planned events or organising an event during the festival period. We are happy to publicise your regular weekly event to give you additional publicity.

If you’re group would like to get involved, please ring Julie on 01454 868570 or Win Williams on 01454 898178
INTERNATIONAL WOMEN’S DAY 2007

SBCP were really pleased to be part of the celebrations for International Women’s Day, sponsored by Bradley Stoke Town Council. Over 200 women attended the event during the day, enjoying the many varied activities that were on offer. During the evening we had a celebration of “Women of the World” and volunteers that have moved into this area from across the world came to share their stories, along with some long-time residents. We also enjoyed music and dance from across the world and were grateful to Kizzy Morrell for being the compere the evening.

Plans for 2008 are well under way and if you’d like to be involved contact Julie or Corrina

Patchway Hate Crimes Group

Patchway ward has the highest reported level of hate crime incidents in South Gloucestershire. According to Avon & Somerset Police, “A hate crime is any incident committed against a person or property that is motivated by the offender’s hatred or dislike of a person or group of people because of their race, religion, gender, disability or sexual orientation.” Patchway Hate Crimes group is a multi-agency meeting and recently we have agreed an action plan

Ensure that staff working across agencies in Patchway have access to training and support

Develop the involvement of children and young people in tackling racism

Bradley Stoke Stronger and Safer Community Group

Bradley Stoke is one of up to 22 areas across South Gloucestershire that will benefit from a new Stronger and Safer Community Group. An inaugural meeting was held in March, and a group has started to meet regularly. The role of the group is to facilitate action that ensures a safer and stronger community in Bradley Stoke. To this end we’ll be looking at how to

Promote pride in the local area as a safe, thriving and pleasant place to live, work and play.

Reduce crime, disorder and drug and alcohol misuse in the area

Empower local people to have a greater voice and influence over local decision making and service delivery by increasing the strength, capacity and engagement of the local community

Improve the quality of life of people in the local area by identifying community aspirations, needs and local priorities.

If you would like to get involved, please ring Julie on 01454 868570
Patchway Community Safety GroupPatchway Community Safety Group is now the Patchway Safer and Stronger Community Group! It is still a partnership of local agencies and organisations, including voluntary groups active within the town, and reps from Neighbourhood Watch groups, but its remit has become wider. It will now look at those things that make a community “strong” such as people having opportunities to get more involved in the life of their community and to be involved in decision making.
“Priorities for change” - the first task of the “new” group will be to organise an event to be held at Scott Park in Patchway during the festival on Saturday July 7th. This will give local people the chance to have their say on what we should be concentrating on to make Patchway an even better place to live, and will provide the basis for an “action plan” for the area.
Matt Hemson, South Gloucestershire Council’s Community Co-ordinator for Priority Neighbourhoods together with Marian Jones, Community Engagement Officer (and part of Matt’s team) will be there to work with the group to run the day. For more information, please contact Julie Snelling, chair of the Patchway Safer and Stronger Community Group on 01454 868570.

The next meeting of the Safer and Stronger Community Group is on Monday 21st May from 11 – 2 at Coniston Community Centre. It’s a bit different from the normal meeting as it’s is an open meeting and will be a chance to find out about Childrens Centres, integrated working, plans for the rest of the Community Centre and to discuss regeneration for the area. Matt will be telling us about plans for the community consultation,that will ensure local people have a voice in shaping priorities for future work. If you’d like to get involved, please give Julie a ring
FOUR TOWNS PLAY ASSOCIATIONWe will be running summer play activities throughout August for children aged 5 – 11 across the Southern Brooks Area. All activities are free. A programme will be sent home through local primary schools in June, and will be available from community centres and libraries. For more information, check the Southern Brooks website or ring Deb Pickard on 01454 868570. We are currently recruiting a team of playworkers and if you are interested please ring Deb. Last year the scheme was more successful than ever, with teams of workers that could provide opportunities for children to take part in sport, drama, arts and crafts and whatever else children wanted to try. We are grateful to the local town and parish councils for their financial support, to South Gloucestershire Council, Almondsbury Charity and the Local Network Fund

FREESPACE

Looking for things for teenagers to do during the summer holidays? Freespace will be running a programme of activities in Bradley Stoke, Patchway, Winterbourne and Stoke Gifford. Freespace is a community group that works in partnerships with South Gloucestershire Youth Service to make sure there are opportunities for teenagers to take part in free or low cost activities. Again, Freespace receives financial support from the Town and Parish Councils. Details available from youth centres, local council offices and from SBCP

BRADLEY STOKE MATTERS

Jaci and Alison from Bradley Stoke Matters have now launched their fabulous new website. Please visit the site regularly as it gives excellent local information and events details of what’s going on in Bradley Stoke.Visit the site @ www.bradleystokematters.co.uk

PATCHWAY COMMUNITY CENTRE is holding its Annual General Meeting on Friday 1st June at 7pm – all welcome

Many people may know that Mo, our wonderful Office Manager, escaped to New Zealand for 3 months to celebrate a rather special birthday. Yvette did a wonderful job of covering for her while she was away, but we’re very glad to have her back in time to finish the end of year accounts!

The extended school clubs (YES clubs) are continuing to run in five primary schools - Baileys Court, Bowsland Green, Callicroft, Coniston and Shield Road as well as three secondary schools which are Bradley Stoke, Filton and Patchway

Sessions run from when the academic day finishes for at least two hours. Activities have included a range of different and varied interests for the children including arts and craft, ball games, team games and team building, initiative and confidence building. A wide range of craft activities have been developed with the young people in the sessions, tee shirt printing, clay tile making and painting along with various other painting and constructing projects.

With the secondary schools whilst the numbers have tended to be smaller than the primary schools the sessions have been constructive for the young people. The activities have been more developmental with drama, sports coaching, healthy eating, music production and work in designing an environmental area for a school. External activity providers have been brought in to give a higher level of instruction for the young people.

The most recent session has started at Patchway Community College. An activity leader has been used to provide sessions of music production. The young people are having the opportunity to learn how to record and produce there own CDs, as of the present time they have laid a number of tracks and the next session should see the final production of the CD.

Over the course of the past academic year around 250 children and young people have attended extended school sessions, and there have been over 350 sessions, we have a staff team of over thirty adults and activity providers, who between them have provided the children and young people who have attended a challenging, fun and rewarding experience

Children’s Fund

The children’s fund sessions have been running successfully with two sessions every Saturday, a total of 50 sessions to date. The staff team has expanded to four regular staff managed by Nicola Alan and they are providing varied activities for a membership aged from 9-13. The sessions have included sports coaching, a Big Brother video project, art, health awareness as well as involving the young people in planning and implementation of other activities.

MELANIE ISBELL PIP PROJECT WORKER

During the last few months, the Patchway Intervention Programme (PIP) has made significant progress with regards to positive outcomes for children; partnership working with other agencies and the development of the project newsletter.

Some young people are receiving focused support work on offending behaviour with supporting leisure activities to address issues around anti-social behaviour and crime: since being involved with PIP, these young people have not been involved in any reported incidents of anti-social behaviour or crime. Another young person has particular difficulties with behaviour in school. Since November, PIP has been providing classroom support twice a week and the young person’s behaviour has improved significantly: the number of ‘red’ letters sent home to parents has reduced by 75%.

Some of the families PIP works with require the support of more than one agency. While some have already had other agency involvement, PIP has initiated partnership working for other families and as a result, has good working relationships with Social Services, Health, Education and the Police.

To increase the young people’s involvement, they now have a part to play in developing their own holiday activity programmes. Young people make suggestions about possible activities, vote for what they would like to do and then progress the ideas into trips by establishing opening times, costs, transport needed etc. During the February half-term, the young people went to Laser Quest and then for pizza, skiing and tobogganing at Churchill and cooked pancakes. PIP now has its own newsletter which includes content put together by the young people. The young people take it in turns to write a feature about something important in their life and answer the ‘hot seat’ questions. They also work in groups to find jokes and competition puzzles.

Stacy Harvey

bradley stoke community development worker

Since being in post I have been working closely with the young mums in Bradley Stoke to set up a weekly support group. This has been going well and after a couple of successful taster sessions we have 12 mums aged between 16 – 21, registered with us. We also held an open coffee morning and invited all agencies along to become familiar with the group and help promote it within their settings. The group are visiting another young mums group in May to look at how they run. The group runs on Tuesday mornings 10 -12 at the Jubilee Centre.
I have also been supporting the “Friends of the Doctors Surgery” to become a registered charity and supporting them with their publicity and fundraising. This group aims to raise funds to provide “extra” at the surgery, to make the time that people spend there more comfortable.
Sadly, I am leaving my post as Community Development Worker to take up a new role at Filton Clinic, although I will be continuing as a Family Support Worker with SBCP.
LOIS PRYCE

SCAFFOLD DIRECTORY PROJECT WORKER

Lois Pryce is our newest member of staff and will be working with us over the next few months to update the Scaffold Family Support Directory. The directory was last produced over three years ago, and people living and working in our area often ask for a copy. So, if you are a new group that would like to be included please contact Lois on 01454 868570. If you were in the last directory, look out for an amendment form that will be winging its way to you. We hope to make the directory accessible through our web page, with an amendment form for organisations to inform us of changes, so that we won’t ever be faced with updating the whole thing again

DOMESTIC ABUSE SUPPORT GROUP

Jackie Davison, who runs our regular Domestic Abuse Support Group, has been away with illness since January. The team send her our best wishes for a speedy recovery. The group has recently received a significant grant from Patchway Town Council, to secure its immediate future, while we source secure long term funding. While Jackie has been away the crèche workers have continued to meet with the women, and we’ll like to thank them for that. Stacy Harvey will now run the group until Jackie returns to work. Thanks also to Survive, who have provided support for us